Rat Poison
by DarkinUnderground
Summary: One of the Joes has been injected will a lethal poison that will slowly kill them, forcing the others to watch helplessly as it happens. Their only chance of saving them is to walk into an obvious Cobra trap to get the antidote. The only problem? They don't know who's been injected with the poison! Tunnel Rat's POV
1. Prologue

Prologue

Baroness stood regally before Cobra Commander as he examined the objects she had presented to him. She knew better than to show her nervousness while in the presence of the commander, Cobra was not one to tolerate weakness in his subordinates.

"Baroness," Cobra's single red eye suddenly focused on the lone woman standing before him, sending a cold chill down her spin. He was not pleased with what she had brought him, she could tell by the tone of his voice alone. "Do you expect me to believe that this," He angrily held up one of the objects, "will rid me of my foes? This is nothing more than a tranquilizer dart! Do you take me for a fool, Baroness?!"

_Yes and a madman._

"Allow me to explain, commander," Baroness requested calmly, not batting an eye at her superiors outburst. Taking one of the darts from the small collection on Cobra's desk, Baroness held it up for him to better examine it. "These are no ordinary darts, Commander. In one of these darts is a lethal poison that, once injected, will slowly and very painfully kill its victim."

"A poison, Baroness," Cobra growled, livid, "You expect me to believe that after failing to destroy those accursed Joes with most advance weapons and technology systems on this whole planet, you expect me to believe that a simple poison will accomplish what years of technical advancement could not?"

"Perhaps we have been looking at this the wrong way, sir."

Single eyebrow raised in surprise, Cobra sat back in his chair, suddenly intrigued. "Go on."

"It has been said that the answer to a complicated problem can be solved by using a simple solution. We saw how effective the Anaconda Strain was in thwarting those Joes. They may have been able to prevent the virus from spreading its carrier, but we have determined that they were unable to completely cure Dr. Schnurr of the virus. The Joes do not have the equipment or medical knowledge needed to properly treat poison, and since the Joes are wanted criminals they would not dare to seek medical help from professionals lest they risk being apprehended by the authorities."

"Hmm, an interesting proposition, Baroness, but you mentioned that only one of the darts is filled with the lethal ejection. Is there more to this plan than simply poisoning our Joes?"

"It is purely psychological," Baroness was quick to answer. "The Joes have developed a strong bond with each other. By only poisoning one of the Joes, we force the others to watch them die in the slowest, most painful, way imaginable. They will do anything to save their comrade, even walk into an obvious trap for the promise of an antidote. This allows us the opportunity to capture the other Joes after they witness the death of one of their own, overwhelmed with the knowledge that they failed to save their comrade they will be too emotionally unstable to resist us. They will be at your complete mercy, commander."

Smiling cruelly behind his mask, Cobra rose to his feet. "This greatly pleases me, Baroness. I trust that you already have everything prepared and ready to initiate this plan of yours?"

"Yes commander, I have already informed Storm Shadow, Destro, and Mindbender of their roles, and they are ready to carry out their assigned jobs. All we need is your permission to continue."

"Very good," Cobra nodded. "You have my permission to use my resources needed to complete this task. I expect this plan to be a complete success, Baroness. You know what the repercussions will be should you fail me again."

"Of course, commander," Baroness nodded, quickly collecting the darts and leaving Cobra's office to begin their plan.

Watching Baroness leave with cruel amusement, Cobra turned his gaze to the monitor screen on his desk. On the screen where military photos taken of the four renegade soldiers who had made it their mission to expose Cobra and his organization's true face to the world. Normally when Cobra would look at the photos he would be overtaken by his anger and hate for them, but this time he only felt amusement when he looked at their unsuspecting faces. This time he would win.

Chuckling quietly, Cobra turned his back to the photos. "Soon I will be rid of you pests, and the best way to kill annoying rats is to use rat poison. They never see it coming."

**O-O-O-O-O**

**Disclaimer: G.I. Joe: Renegades and its respective characters do not belong to me in any way.**

**Sorry it's so short, but it is just a prologue so I guess it's to be expected. I tried to copy what the actual episodes did and gave you the "baddies" evil plan first before anything else. It adds more dramatic irony that way! *Ahem* Moving on, the rest of the story will be told through Tunnel Rats point of view, so that'll be interesting. He is the team's medic so he will have a big role to play! Unfortunately, classes start back up next week, so I'm not sure when I'll be able to update this. Things have already started to pick up so I'm a busy camper!**

**But enough about that! Tell me how I did! Is this story something you guys might be interested in or should I just stop where I am?**

**Review! **


	2. Chapter 1

**Two whole books read, two essays written, and four midterms taken and I finally found the free time to type this chapter! It's late, very late, I know, but I did say it would take a while for me to update. So I guess it was to be expected then, so don't be too upset with me.**

**Disclaimer: G.I. Joe Renegades and its respective characters belong to Hasbro, but I will claim this stories plot.**

**O-O-O-O-O **

**Rat Poison**

**Chapter 1**

There's nothing quite like waking up to a log thrown across your stomach, especially when said log is in actuality the arm of a certain powerhouse by the name of Marvin Hinton (aka Roadblock). The guy has more power than you'd think by looking at him, and he looks pretty darn strong to begin with, so when said muscle man decides to roll over in his sleep and flop his arm over your stomach it's bound to hurt. A lot. Ugh, it's a good thing I didn't have to go to the bathroom or anything.

Successfully winded, and just a _little_ bit cranky, I grumpily grabbed ahold of Roadblock's wrist and flung his arm back onto **his** stomach. The reaction I got wasn't nearly the one I had wanted; all he did in response to his arm being thrown onto his stomach was snort in surprise and roll over onto his side. How anti-climactic, I was hoping for something a little more along the lines of waking **him** up and ruining whatever pleasant dream **he** had been having. No such luck, the guy could sleep through a freight train roaring by his ear, and with the way Duke snores it's no wonder he's usually the well-rested of all of us!

Thoroughly aggravated, and not likely to go back to sleep anytime soon (my stomach still hurts); I begrudgingly crawled out of my sleeping bag and stretched. It was only then did I realize that there were three people missing from our merry little campsite. Roadblock, obviously, wasn't missing, if my smarting stomach and his sprawled out form next to my foot were any indication. Ripcord was likewise still here, curled up in his sleeping bag and sleeping peacefully on the other side of Roadblock. I wasn't sure if I was jealous that he was asleep or happy, ironically, Ripcord is the quietest sleeper out of us. Whether that's a cruel joke or not that Ripcord can be the quietest sleeper I couldn't say, but these rare moments of quiet are pure bliss. There's no telling how long it'll last before the guy wakes up and starts running his mouth, might as well enjoy it while I can.

And that's it. The only people still at camp are Roadblock, Ripcord, and me. It's not unusual for the ninja to disappear on us, heck; it's probably in the ninja manual to disappear on your pals out of the blue and only reappear to play knight in black spandex. I'm not even surprised that Red is missing either, knowing her she's probably with the ninja doing teacher and pupil things… That or they finally tied the knot and are off sucking face or something… Aw, yuck! Mental image out of my head! I didn't need the image of those two making out in my head! Get out! Get out Get out!

"Tunnel Rat, why are you hitting yourself?"

Squawking in surprised, and a little embarrassed that someone had caught me trying to literally knock a certain mental image out of my head. I spun to face where the voice had come from, and found the last member of our merry little band of misfits.

"Yo Duke, w-where ya been?" I laughed nervously; all too aware of the weird look he was giving me. "We missed you!"

A thin blond eyebrow raised in amusement. "We?" he inquired, pointedly looking at the still sleeping forms of Roadblock and Ripcord. He was obviously ignoring my first question. "Looks like you're the only one here who's awake, Tunnel Rat."

"Just give me a minute to find a stick," I said, grinning. "Roadblock's still afraid of spiders, right?"

Duke groaned, shaking his head. Apparently he didn't approve of my methods. Hey, at least I didn't suggest hitting the guy in the stomach with a log or some other heavy object! Even though he kinda deserves it…

"Let them sleep, as you've probably already noticed Scarlett and the ninja are missing. That usually means that she's found another Cobra conspiracy to endanger our lives with. They need all the rest they can get."

Now it was my turn to groan_. Great, another Scarlett conspiracy mission, just what I always wanted first thing in the morning, another chance for Cobra's goons to start shooting at us._

"What are you doing up anyway, Tunnel Rat? Shouldn't **you** be asleep too?" Duke suddenly asked, catching me by surprise and snapping me out of my grumbling. His voice sounded strained…almost like he was afraid of the answer. Almost like he was worried about something…

_Are those bags under his eyes?_

I shrugged my shoulders carelessly, pretending that I didn't notice the signs Duke was unknowingly giving off of exhaustion. "Meh, let's just say that the big guy gave me a rude awakening…and a bruised stomach to boot." I joked, trying to lighten the mood. Unfortunately, that seemed to have had the opposite effect on our self-proclaimed leader.

"A bruise," Duke asked, voice sounding unusually strained. "He hit you?"

_Whoa, time to back up there Duke!_

"No," I said a little louder than necessary. "He didn't hit me, he just rolled over and his arm landed on my stomach when he did. The guy has more strength than we give him credit for, but all he really did was wake me up and wind me a bit. But I'm a big boy Duke, I can handle a little love tap. No need to mother me."

Duke sighed, obviously relieved, and nodded his understanding. "Why don't you try to get some more sleep? You'll need it." He said, making his way tiredly toward our campsite, seating himself on one of the logs we had used as makeshift seats while eating another round of Roadblock's mystery mush.

Ignoring Duke's suggestion to rest, that really was a tempting offer; I instead seated myself on the other log across from the one he was sitting on. When Duke responded to this by giving me a confused look I just grinned. "Not tired, besides, you look like you need company."

I was rewarded with a role of the eyes and an amused chuckled. "Suit yourself, but don't come complaining to me when Scarlett and the ninja come back with a life threatening mission. And you know how long those missions tend to drag on…"

"…I hate it when you're right."

"Which is always."

"I don't wana hear it, Duke!"

O-O-O-O-O

**Thank you to everyone who took the time to review, and I hope you continue to tell me your thoughts! It's thanks to those reviews that I finally got over my writer's block!**

**Thank You! And please review!**

**(I know you guys want to know who's going to be poisoned, but please be patient. I need to work my way to first before anything, but don't worry, I already know who I want to poison and how I'm going to go about getting them poisoned and how he/she will be cured. So please be patient until then!)**

O-O-O-O-O

**Review Responses: **

**Le Fey**: Thanks! I'll try to be quicker with my updates in the future, but no promises!

**Firestar9mm: **I always did wonder why they never tried a psychological attack in the cartoon; it would have made an interesting change of pace. But then again it is a cartoon, it's to be expected. Either way, I hope my take of Psychological warfare is up to your standards and thanks for the review!

**helen the 2****nd**: Very well! I shall continue and here is its next chaper!

**the phantom of the arts**: It is hard trying to find time to make updates, huh? I feel your pain my friend! Thank you for your support!

**jadeoftheworld**: I updated, I updated, I updated! You can't go wrong with a Tunnel Rat centric story, can you? Thanks for the review!

**Dessi16**: Very well, I think I shall! Thanks for the review!

**Kittyfan12**: I can't have that, you living with the suspense I mean. Don't worry, I shall continue, but it'll be some time before I reveal who gets poisoned. So stay tuned! And thanks for the review!

**Dustyfay**: It is updated! I'm glad you liked it, and thanks for the review!


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